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Sky House - 11 East 29th Street - Condo - Flatiron - by FX Fowle

A Curbed exclusive by way of a special correspondent: the much loved and landmarked Little Church Around the Corner (aka the Church of Transfiguration) on East 29th Street (above, looking east) just off Fifth Avenue has apparently struck a deal with the devil... er, with developers. The church's auxiliary structure, a modern addition to the east, will be demolished and combined with other properties to the north on 30th Street to create a thru-block parcel for a 50-story residential tower. Writes our correspondent,

How do we know this? We live on the block and for several weeks have noticed surveyors taking measurements. Then we noticed architect-types with interesting eyewear loitering on the block, snapping digital photos. When approached they were all hush hush, refusing to answer questions and walking back into the church. Then last week we saw two church workers on the block and asked them what was up. One remained silent but the other was good enough to give us the gory details. Demolition will begin in about a year. The church will take the first two or three floors of the tower for their programs. We lose our morning sunlight. And Manhattan loses a little piece of its soul.
What happens now? Expect the preservationists to come out in force against the demolition. The Little Church, for its part, was made famous in 1870 with the exclamation, "God Bless the Little Church Around the Corner!" The chants may well be different this time.
· History of the Little Church [littlechurch.org].

"A 54-story condominium apartment tower to be known as Sky House will rise at 11 East 29th Street using air rights from the adjacent Church of the Transfiguration, known familiarly as the Little Church Around the Corner, at 1 East 29th Street.

The new, 138-unit tower will rise across the street from the Madison Belvedere, a 50-story, 400-unit rental tower at 10 West 29th Street.

The Clarett Group is the developer of Sky House. Clarett is also erecting the 36-story Plaza 57, another condo tower, on the former site of the Sutton Theater at 207 East 57th Street.

According to Fox & Fowle, the architects for the 138-unit Sky House, “to help the building blend with its lower-scale surroundings, the building was divided into three slender masses,” each clad in a red-brown iron-spot brick. “The element facing 29th Street and overlooking the church is set back from the street and has an architectural expression of vertical piers….Like a belfry or campanile, this almost-square tower soars into the sky celebrating and defining the presence of the historic landmark. The church’s parish house is a new three-story structure at the base of the tower that projects forward to the sidewalk, thus extending the scale and refined architectural detail of the church compound toward the east.”

The new tower will have an extremely high height-to-width ratio, perhaps somewhat like that Trump World Tower on First Avenue. While it clearly towers over the charming church complex and gardens, it is considerably thinner than Madison Belvedere at 10 West 29th Street.

The church building was erected in 1849 on what were then the outskirts of the city.

In 1923, the Episcopal Actors' Guild was founded and it carries on an active program at its national headquarters in the church's Guild Hall and such theatrical greats as Basil Rathbone, Tallulah Bankhead, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Charlton Heston, and Rex Harrison served on its council."

Any renderings? Going to be a very narrow tower for sure. I remember that prelim. rendering didn't look that great, and the article says it's still brick.

Currently under construction, Sky House is a 54-story luxury condominium located at 11 East 29th Street in Manhattan’s Flatiron District. This dynamic building designed by Fox & Fowle Architects features 138 one, two and three bedroom homes.

It could have been worse ( the wall looks nice....and no balconies sticking out) but still, this indeed looks like one of those notorious "sliver buildings". I thought this sort of stuff was outlawed long ago. Put up a few more and you´ve got a nice formula for making a neighborhood ugly and unlivable. As usual the building´s PR department will certainly create a web site showing the charms of living in a neighboorhood of low and intimate scale buildings. Funny ain´t it?

Sky House, at 11 East 29th Street, a 54-story condo being developed by the Clarett Group, will be on the site of the parish house for the Church of the Transfiguration, better known as the Little Church Around the Corner. "The parish house was not landmarked," Ms. Hackett said, "so we will take it down, and they will have the first four floors of our building."

Marrying a slender contemporary tower to the Gothic Revival-style church was a challenge. "As architects there were two strategies we could have pursued," said Dan Kaplan, senior principal at Fox & Fowle Architects. "We could have aped the existing building on a larger scale, which we thought was wrong, or we could do a neutral backdrop. So we have created a slender tower with piers of brick interspersed with floor-to-ceiling glass."

The condos, three per floor starting at the sixth floor, will look out either on the church's garden or over the West Side. Prices for the one- and two-bedroom apartments will range from about $870,000 to $2.2 million. "We will have a mix of smaller units that are not typically available," Ms. Hackett said.

Bishop Andrew St. John, vicar of the church, is hoping that the proliferation of new buildings nearby will bring in an infusion of new worshipers. "People are coming from nearby blocks and introducing themselves," he said.

Slim Indeed

Real estate is about place and space; better understanding of each allows more successful and inspiring developments. This building illustrates the typical architecture in Hong Kong. Tall, slim buildings in small groups that look like asparagus planted in the bay. Certainly, a home is a place--perhaps the place!; that's why the ownership of one defines a person's feeling of achievement. So whether you live on the 76th floor penthouse at One Central Park, or in this tall SLIM building, remember one thing - home sweet home.